100 Years
by the.brown.eyed.girl
Summary: A look back at the life Artemis could have had, if he hadn't let it slip through his fingers. ArtemisxOC


**Memo**: I've been sitting on this for awhile, and now it's finally all finished and edited. Just a little background, this a companion piece to my AF story There's A GIRL At St. Bartleby's. Kris gets unknowingly transferred/accepted to the school, shit proceeds to go down. She's tortured, which is where she gets her scars, Artemis saves her, which is where the memories start. This is pretty song fic-esque, and the song is '100 Years' by Five for Fighting. Lyrics that have ages in them are Artemis's memories. All others are Artemis as he is for the beginning of the story.

Summary: Artemis looks back on the life he could've had, if he hadn't let it slip through his fingers.

_Thank you to undauntedscholar, my lovely beta reader._

**Disclaimer**: I own every character in this one shot EXCEPT Artemis. Funny how that works out.

* * *

_-There's never a wish better than this, when you've only got 100 years to live-_

**A**rtemis could still remember her perfectly, even now, as he sat on his deathbed and awaited the inevitable. He could still recall every shining detail, every brief, glimmering moment she had spent in his life. She shone like a meteor behind his filmy, aged eyes. The brightest part of his life; the one thing he had ever let go. His Kristina. Beckett and Myles sat by his side, quiet as the Death that wasn't far off, but Artemis was elsewhere, caught up in his own brilliant mind. They could've had a life together, he and Kristina; together they could've been phenomenal. But he had lost her. He had lost meaning. Now he could only imagine. And so he did.

Artemis imagined His Kristina.

_-I'm 15 for a moment, and I'm just dreaming-_

**T**he moment she kissed him in the car, he knew. Without a doubt, he knew. There was only one person the genius wanted to spend his life with. There was only one person the genius could stand to spend his life with. And she sat right next to him, beautiful, shattered and radiant. She sat right next to him, innocent, vulnerable and yet powerful beyond belief, eyes closed as she poured the contents of her heart into his own.

Finally, his heart seemed to sigh. Finally, it had found something it hadn't even realized was missing. Here, here felt nice. Here, kissing Kris in the back of his family car, felt wonderful and tingly and ill-timed and perfect and so-wrong-it's-good. His heart swelled, beating out of time and off rhythm, pumping its deepest secrets back into Kristina's. I carry your heart, I carry it in my heart. Perhaps E. wasn't such a crack pot after all. This was wonderful.

His Kristina's lips were moving against his own and they were chapped and bruised and uncared for, yet somehow soft and careful and moving in ways that weren't kosher, that couldn't be legal. But it felt right. It felt so, _so_ right.

So Artemis did the only logical thing; he kissed her back. The genius kissed her back and his heart thrummed, flip-flopping wildly as his lips moved, clumsy and unsure against her own. As he responded, Kristina responded right back and their lips were moving in ways Artemis had never thought of before. He felt a tongue, her tongue, grazing along his lower lip as Kris demonstrated in full detail her Superior Expertise On All Things Kissing. A shiver slid down his spine and by the time they drew apart, he found the space between their bodies had dramatically decreased.

Kristina drew back a little, stunned, and he noticed idly that his fingers seemed to be entwined in her matted hair. Interesting. The genius had absolutely no memory of putting them there. Experimentally, he twirled a few strands curious as to what she would do. When His Kristina shivered slightly and seemed to lean into his touch, Artemis smiled. Some part of his body seemed to glow and expand, filling his head with a light, giddy feeling and making it hard for him to think straight. Although, if this is what happened when not thinking straight entered the equation, perhaps he should not think straight much more often.

His Kristina on the other hand, still looked a little shell shocked, as if she had not expected him to return her actions. Her beautiful face wavered somewhere between the lines of pleasant surprise and terrible hurt fury. The indecision highlighted her features and crafted them into a new terrifying creature the likes of which Artemis had never seen. Behold the lover scorned and loved anew.

Decision seemed to hit her at last, and the girl he loved moved. Her fragile human body contorted and shifted, her arm half raised, her hand half fisted as if to hit him. Oh no, none of this. Artemis had received enough bodily harm lately, he didn't need any more, especially not from the one person his heart seemed set on.

One of his hands detangled itself from her hair and moved to stop the movement of her good hand, trapping her fingers in his own.

"None of that please," he requested gently, but there was a husky undertone to his voice that the boy had not expected. Perhaps a post-snogging effect? Maybe he'd have the opportunity to look in to it later.

Furious, Kris opened her mouth, no doubt to shoot off some pithy and stinging retort that would force Artemis back into the shell he had only recently abandoned. But the words never quite make it out. Because Artemis was kissing her again.

This, he decided, was the best form of diplomacy he had never used. The so-wrong-it's-good feeling kept thrumming in his brain, pulsing dopamine and norepinephrine into places of his body Artemis had never thought would need them. Kissing Kris electrified him, calmed him, overwhelmed him, comforted him, terrified him, exalted him, humbled him, all at the same. It was like a shot of liquid sunshine straight into his veins. Every inch of him seemed to tingle and hum. Not even his dastardly and most cunning plans could compare to this. He never wanted to stop.

After a short, searing moment, Kris pulled away again, flushed and still furious. "If you think you can just kiss your way back into my life, Artemis Fowl you are sadly mistaken! I am furious with you, you hear? Goddamn furious! So take your good kissing and your perfect hair and your blue eyes that really ought to be illegal, and your… your attractive-ness and that stupid smirk and the way your looking at me right now like I'm some sort of goddess and just go- Oh, screw it!"

With that, she untwined their fingers, grabbed Artemis by his well pressed and official looking tie and tugged him to her before kissing him fiercely on the lips, with no signs of ever stopping.

Surely, Artemis thought as he wrapped himself, around her and let Kristina display her Superior Expertise On All Things Kissing once more, this was the start of something wonderful.

_-I'm 22 for a moment, and she feels better than ever-_

**F**or weeks, Artemis had been planning this moment. Planning this one, singular moment in time with an obsession that rivaled any plan he had ever made, including his latest underworld adventure. After weeks of planning and checking and double-checking and back-to-the-drawing-board moments and never-in-my-life-have-I-been-this-stressed feelings, it had finally arrived. The Moment.

"Arty," How he had let Kristina pick up his mother's pet name for him, the man would never know. "Dear, you know I've been to your house before." She chided.

The man in question blinked and cast his girlfriend a questioning look. His Kristina had matured since leaving school. Her face had thinned out slightly, her curls grown more manageable with time. The faint traces of scars that lanced across her arms and along her high cheekbones had faded into whispers, mere suggestions of a questionable past. Her eyes, those round misty orbs that had once captivated him in the Physics room, remained unchanged and ageless.

"I would hope you've been to the Manor before, Mother spent all that time outfitting a room for you." He replied.

Kristina laughed, and Artemis could clearly remember why he'd spent weeks planning this one day. His world seemed better when Kristina laughed.

"Yes, she did, didn't she?" His Kristina chuckled, a smile still hinting at the corner of her lips. "Now, will you please stop clutching the steering wheel like that? You make me nervous when you drive with that look on your face."

Artemis rolled his eyes, but obeyed, loosening his death grip on the steering wheel as he carefully turned the car off the main road and onto a well-paved country lane.

"This isn't the turn of the Manor," Kris said, voice laced with suspicion.

"Yes, I know." He replied easily, completely ignoring the panic underlying his girlfriend's voice. His Kristina had never been good with surprises.

She'd started pouting, Artemis could tell without looking. After seven years of knowing her: one year of school together, four years of keeping in touch and travelling back and forth from the States and the Golden Isle and two years of living together, Artemis knew some things without even having to look.

"You know my stance on surprises, Genius Boy," Kristina warned.

Artemis smirked. Pulling out that nickname again, hmm? She must really hate surprises. He hadn't heard Genius Boy in years. It had faded out once he'd stopped dealing with the LEP and started his own, outrageously successful technology business. Apparently, old habits hard.

"Come now Kris, whoever said I was surprising you?" he asked innocently.

Her reply came swiftly, "And I quote, 'we can spend the weekend with my parents, they'd like that, I'll pick you up at 6 tomorrow.' Sound familiar?"

Artemis was dutifully impressed with her ability to memorize everything he told her. "I said that last Wednesday," he quipped, hoping to get a rise out of her.

As he'd hoped, a blush rose to color Kristina's rosy cheeks a deeper hue of red. "That's completely beyond the point!" She blustered.

The smirk shifted into a smile and he spared her a short, blazing look that silenced her griping. "You'll like this love, I promise."

Even after seven years, he still marveled at why she stuck around for him. After the make-out session in the back of his Bentley, Kristina had still claimed to remain furious at him. It had taken several months of fights and making up and waiting on pins and needles before she'd fully forgiven him. Even after that, Artemis fought tooth and nail to find some way to show her daily that she was his entire existence. His heart belonged to her in the most complete sense of the way. Should she ever leave him, his heart would leave as well and all that would remain would be a shallow, incomplete shade of what he might have been. Everything he had done, he had done for her. Starting Fowl Corporations, moving out of the Manor to share her small flat in Dublin (although this, he had assured Mother, was only temporary), was all for her.

One girl, seven years, and one thoroughly changed multimillionaire genius.

The car pulled to a stop in front of a large gate. Even from this far away, Artemis could see the sprawling greens and cluttered buildings that made up his old school.

"This is…" Kris started to say as Artemis cut her off with a simple smile and a nod. "But why…?"

"If you'd come with me, love?" Artemis asked, offering her his hand as he led her away from the parked Bentley.

His Kristina. His saviour. She was the one girl who had ever gained access to his heart. She was the only person who had ever succeeded in knowing him inside and out. She was all he'd ever need in life. The genius had money, family, a nice car and a marvelous house yet all he wanted was her.

Slowly, they made their way across the grounds.

"How'd you get a key?" Kristina asked, mystified.

"O'Connor lent me one."

"Since when do you talk to Raleigh?" she asked.

"Since when do you ask so many questions?" He replied as they neared a small incline. Small candles peppered the hill, glowing like ethereal fireflies amongst the grass. Above them, the stars were just coming out. On top of the hill lay a pile of blankets and cushions, creating a large, bed-like cove on the grass. Next to the blankets were chocolate-covered strawberries, red velvet cupcakes and champagne. All of Kristina's favorite things.

"What…what's going on, Artemis?" Kristina scooted closer to him, searching for answers in the hooded blue eyes.

"Remember last time we were here?" He asked softly, turning to face her.

She blinked, still trying to figure things out. "Yeah, my first year here. This is where we had our first date. You took me stargazing, kissed my cheek and told me you liked me."

"Well, I more than like you, Kristina," he breathed. They stood close enough together that he didn't need to raise his voice. His breath ghosted her face. "I love you. You're the only thing in this world I need."

Here it was. The Moment. The one Moment in time that could change the rest of his life. The Moment he had stressed over, lost sleep over, planned, re-planned and dreamt of. Finally, it was here.

Slowly, deliberately, he bent down on one knee and reached into his pocket for the little velvet box. Kristina, His Kristina, drew a shaky breath.

"Artemis…?"

"Kristina, love. …Marry me?"

Tears pricked the corners of her eyes. "Oh, Artemis," she breathed. Artemis knelt there, waiting on pins and needles. "Oh, Artemis." She seemed incapable of saying much else, but she had started nodded furiously. "Oh, oh, Artemis."

A weight lifted off his chest and suddenly he felt lighter than air. Giddy, he stood up, slipping the ring on to her finger. The lighter than air feeling intensified as he watched her stare at it, loving the way it fit on her finger, the way it fit her. His Kristina. Finally, she would truly be His Kristina. His Kristina at last.

_-I'm 33 for a moment, a kid on the way babe, a family on my mind-_

**H**ospitals. Artemis had always hated hospitals. He had hated them when his grandfather had died in one; he had hated them when his father had been forced to recover in one. Now, he hated them as his wife lay just behind a pair of doors, swearing like a sailor and just out of reach.

He could hear her from where he sat, an unopened magazine clutched tightly in his hand. They called him out of a meeting for this, for him to wait in a crowded, sterilized room and hope for the best. All his secretary had managed to get out before he had left had been, "Mr. Fowl, it's time." And he had left, simple as that. After all, one's wife did not have a baby every day.

A baby. The baby. His baby. He and Kristina were having a baby. In a short matter of time, new life would slide in to the world, squalling, brand new and ever-so-tiny and ever-so-perfect. He had never seen a baby being born before. Of course, he knew how it would happen. He knew how everything happened. But he had never seen a baby being born before. Seeing and knowing were different, so very different.

Kristina wouldn't let him in the birthing room until the doctor was certain her labor was almost over. Naturally, Artemis had protested most vehemently. The nurse barring him entrance passed on Kristina's message. Tell him, his wife had said, that when he gets stressed, he rattles off scientific facts from memory and tries to explain quantum physics. I do not need that while I'm pushing something roughly the size of a small watermelon out of a part of my body that is definitely not roughly the size of a small watermelon. And that had been that.

Shortly after, Artemis had found himself in the waiting room, clutching a magazine and staring at the door. The synapses in his brain fired off a mile a minute, trying to compensate for what he could not see. What would his child look like? His Kristina had point blank refused to know what the gender would be, claiming that this would be the one surprise she could ever stand to take. What would the child act like? All of his wife's friends had insisted that no book could properly prepare them for parenthood. Of course, Artemis had read them anyway. Knowledge held power knowledge held safety. Would the child like him? Oh, what a worrying thought! Would the child like him?

Artemis had no idea how to be a father. None whatsoever. He had no real example from which to base himself off. His own father had always been a businessman and had remained such until it was quite too late to begin parenting his child. Artemis had, in essence, raised himself. How could he raise the life begging to arrive in the next room? How could care for the ever-so-tiny, ever-so-perfect being-to-be that awaited him?

For once, his nerves got the better of him and the magazine in his hand crumpled.

"First time Da, eh?" Someone from across the room asked, regarding the multi-millionaire with knowing amusement.

Artemis blinked, still not used to casual interactions with complete strangers. "Yes."

The man laughed. "Well, you're in for one helluva ride. Don't worry, it'll get easier."

Instinctively, Artemis leaned forward, eager for advice. He could not learn this from a book. "When?"

"When you die!" The man laughed again. "Listen, parenting isn't some joy ride for the light hearted. It's hard, it's stressful and it can't be taught. You can rest assured that you won't be getting a good night's sleep for the next twenty or so years of your life. More, if you have more kids. But it's worth it. It's worth it."

If this man was trying to sell Artemis on his new role in life, he certainly wasn't doing a good job of it. "How is it worth it?" Artemis asked, baffled.

The man's face softened. "You'll know. When you first hold that baby, that innocent, perfect, brand new creature, you'll know. Your world shifts when you look into your child's face. Nothing becomes more important than that one, tiny life in your hands. And that's when you know."

Artemis didn't have to ask with words this time, the man seemed to know exactly what the genius wanted to say.

"That's when you know that for your child, you would move the mountains and change the tides. That's when you know that for your child, you'd spin the earth backwards and stop the sun from setting if they wanted it. That's when you know what it is to love unconditionally, irrevocably, just on sight. Children change everything, my friend. Children change everything."

Artemis sat, dumbfounded, as the man got up with a smile and walked away.

Children change everything. Children change everything. How would his child change him?

Then the nurse peaked out of the door. "Mr. Fowl? You can come in now."

Artemis surged upwards and into the room. His Kristina lay in bed, sweating and swearing and oh-so-beautiful. Knowing his role well, Artemis crossed to his wife, gripped her hand, kept his mouth shut and waited.

Not ten minutes later and one last, God-spurning, pain-induced thread of swear words later and his child slid her way into the world.

"It's a girl," the doctor confirmed.

Artemis' heart grew and fluttered. A girl. His daughter. Oh, he had a daughter. Shaking, he stared at her, his yet to be named, ever-_ever-_so-perfect daughter as the doctor first passed her to Kristina.

"What are you going to call her?" the doctor asked. "I need it for the records."

Exhausted, His Kristina smiled down at the beautiful, perfect baby cradled in her arms. "Isabelle. Isabelle Angeline Fowl. What did you think, Arty?"

Isabelle. His Isabelle. His daughter. Oh, he couldn't agree more.

"Isabelle," he murmured. And as Kristina passed him their daughter, he understood what the man had told him.

Children change everything. Unconditional, irrevocable love, just on sight. Isabelle Angeline. His daughter.

_-I'm 45 for a moment, chasing the years of my life-_

"**J**ames, get out of my room!" His twelve your old daughter sure had pipes. Artemis could hear his daughter screaming from his study. As usual, the door remained propped open just in case any of his children wanted him. Normally they left their father alone when he worked but sometimes the twins would stop by and give him a few minutes of trouble.

"Mom, he's taking my stuff again!" Isabelle cried.

"James Eoin," His wife scolded their eldest son. "Give Isabelle back whatever you took."

"But Ma," James whined. "She took my stuff first."

"Did not!" Isabelle protested.

"Did to!"

"If this nonsense doesn't stop by the time I count to ten, you'll both be cleaning the stables for a week." Oh how Artemis loved it when His Kristina took charge. "Now, James, give your sister back her things. Isabelle, give your brother back his things."

After that, Artemis heard nothing. Fear of their mother's wrath must have paid off. Settling back in his chair, he took to thinking. Thirty-two years. Twenty-two years of marriage, one year of engagement, seven years of dating, one year of friendship. Thirty-two years spent with His Kristina. Thorty-two years passed since he had done anything remotely dastardly or underhanded. Part of him ached with the urge to do something decidedly un-domestic. Part of him longed for the opportunity to relive the high drama, perilous, heart-racing days of his youth. He longed for affirmation of the fact that he was, in fact, still the smartest thing on the surface of the Earth.

Next week, Fowl Corporations flew out to a conference in New York. Perhaps, when he arrived, Artemis could plan a…detour, see if Jon Spiro was still holding up well in prison. Surely, there was something the billionaire had managed to hide, something that Artemis might manage to steal. Nothing like a little grand theft to put a man in the right again. Yes, that's what he would do.

"Da?" curious grey eyes peered around the doorframe at him.

Artemis turned around to Niall hovering just close enough to the door to be seen. "Niall," he said as warmly as he knew how. "Come in."

"Tegan doesn't want to play with me," his son pouted as he crossed the room, crawling into his father's lap.

Artemis stared down at his son for a moment, somewhat at a loss for what to do. Usually, the kids went to Kris for problems like these. "Why would that be?" he ventured cautiously.

"All she wants to do play is dolls. I want to play bank robber, because when I play bank robber, the robber never gets caught. And yesterday, I tried to teach her about atoms and she didn't even want to listen. Then I went to James and he called me a nerd. And Isabelle doesn't like getting dirty. Ma said you would play with me if I wanted to play science."

For a minute, Artemis didn't say anything. He merely stared down at his son, who looked so much like Kristina, as if seeing him for the very first time. If Artemis had been a normal child, something Kris often assured him he probably wasn't, was this what he would have turned out like? No one to play with but his workaholic father? He didn't think about his childhood often, but the genius supposed it had been lonely. For some reason, he didn't quite have the heart in him to go see Mr. Spiro again. What sort of example had he been setting for Niall, the child who had turned out so very much like him? If he went away for extended periods of time to thieve and pilfer, did it make him any better than the distant, gold obsessed man his own father had once been?

"Will you play with me, Da?" Niall implored, staring hopefully up at his dumbfounded father.

Artemis continued to stare at his seven-year-old son, watching the life Niall could have pan out before him. The boy could grow up in a house where the one person who might understand him is never around. Surrounded by siblings who would always love him, but never quite be at his level, he might feel, Artemis supposed, like an outsider looking in. As for school, it would be the same; smarter than everyone there, infuriately brilliant, but with no one to share it with it. The same lonely life Artemis had once had, before he found the LEP and Butler and Kristina. How long would it take Niall to find his own Kristina? Too long probably, too long to find Her, far too long for a father to stand by and do nothing.

That thought alone made his decision for him. No trip to New York to visit an old enemy. No trips to anywhere to revisit enemies or relive the glory years. He had given it all up for a reason, after all. He had given it up for His Kristina, for the family they could have. Do have, now. All of those wonderful thrills, he had given it all up for the possibility of Niall. Now he had Niall. Niall, Tegan, James and Isabelle. Four wonderful, shining opportunities he wouldn't trade for all the brilliant plans in the world.

"Of course I will play with you, Niall." He said affectionately, ruffling his son's hair. "Am I correct in assuming you would like to play teacher this time around?"

His son's face lit up as he nodded eagerly. "Sit on the floor, Da! I'm going to teach you all about atoms now."

Willingly, Artemis sat on the floor of his study and for the first time in a very long time, he let himself be taught.

_-Half the time goes by, another blink of the eye 67 is gone-_

**T**he mind fades with age. Memories dim. Eventually eyesight fails, hearing decreases, the muscles and limbs grow weak from disuse. Even the best grow old.

Artemis looked out of his window, onto the grounds he could no longer keep. His blue eyes, though slightly filmy now, had lost none of their intensity. The rolling green grass of the Manor held so many memories and as he gazed out on at them, he could almost picture a troop of fairies scuttling up the drive, only to be replaced by James and Isabelle having piggie-back races with the twins. Then he blinked, and the image left him. This place held too many memories for an old man, far too many memories.

"Artemis?" Kristina's voice had mellowed with age, but to Artemis it still sounded exactly as it had when they were young: sincere, light and just a little mischievous at all times.

Turning, Artemis met his wife with a smile.

"You've been thinking again, haven't you?" she scolded gently. "You've been doing far too much of that recently."

"What else do I have to do, love?" he asked, letting some of his frustration leak out in to his voice. Kristina would understand, she always did.

After all, geniuses did not normally age well. For what is one supposed to do when the mind still works a mile a minute but the body does not? When your brain does not fade as others do, but stays sharp and keen in a body that has trouble getting up and down stairs? Artemis' body had grown old, yet his mind was not quite there. He had a head full of memories and plans and schemes and forbidden knowledge to reconcile to a body that did not seem to want to leave home.

Home. For a moment, Artemis forgot about his company and stared around at the house, his home. Fowl Manor was the only home he knew, the only place he had ever really lived. True, they had a summer home in Seattle and a cottage that Kristina liked on the coast. But Isabelle lived in that cottage on the coast now and Niall liked to stay in the summer home. He and His Kristina had grown old. They had grown old together in the place he grew up. There was something extremely poetic about that. That his children ran in the same halls that he once had, that his grandchildren played in the same nooks and crannies that his children had. There something extremely poetic about that, too.

"James won't take the house," he said at last, pain leaking through his voice.

"Arty, James doesn't want the Manor." Kristina said softly as she placed a hand on his arm.

Distressed, Artemis turned to look at his wife. "Why? I want to give it to him."

"Darling, James is a proud man. He's 31 now, we can't provide for him forever."

His logical brain understood and agreed with his wife, but his heart couldn't see the point. James was his firstborn son. Nail may have turned out more like himself, but James…James was his firstborn son. Children change everything.

"I want him to be happy." Artemis sounded guilty, pleading, as if wanting happiness for his children had become a criminal offense. "He is my son."

His Kristina leaned forward and kissed his wrinkled cheek. "I understand you, Artemis, but we have to let them grow up sometime, don't we? Besides, cheer up. Your precious son and Molly are bringing the kids over. You can talk to him then."

"Come on Ma, talking about me again?" James's soft baritone voice rang from the door frame and the couple turned to see their son flanked by his sweet wife and their two children, Lily and Mark.

"Grandda!" Lily squealed and Artemis somehow managed to scoop the fiery five-year-old into his arms as she threw herself at him.

"She's been asking for you all week," his son sounded amused and slightly proud. "Apparently you've got the best stories Da."

Artemis stared at his son, wanting desperately to make him see how much he cared, how much James taking the house would mean to him. "Well, you certainly seemed to like them, Jimmy."

James shrugged. "Who wouldn't, Da? All that magic and espionage… those were the adventures of legend."

Unexpectedly, Artemis's heart swelled. He had never told his children that the stories he told were true. Never once had he let on that their favorite bedtime story hero had been their father, the ordinary man who worked too hard and too long. Now, his son told him that he, the father he wouldn't take help from, was the stuff of legend. Artemis' throat constricted.

His Kristina cut in, no doubt recognizing the look on her husband's face. "Oh, well if it's adventures of legends these kids want, I have plenty of stories of their father to tell."

Mark's eyes lit up and he moved away from his place at his mother's side. "Really? What has Da done, Grandma?"

Laughing, James held up his hands in surrender. "Hey now, I was just a kid back then."

"You weren't a kid for half of these stories, James Thomas." Kristina teased, holding her grandson's hand.

"Oh, now we're definitely leaving." James said with a smile. "God forbid I'm around for this. Ready Mols?" his wife nodded and headed out to the car after kissing her children goodbye.

His son paused at the door. "Da?" he said, not looking at his father, but at a point somewhere to the right of his shoulder, "I could never take this house from you, not while you're still alive to make it magical." Seemingly embarrassed, James rubbed the back of his head turned around and left.

Impatiently, Lily tugged on her grandfather's sleeve. "Tell me about the little blue box, Grandda! That's my favorite."

"Ah yes, the little blue cube. The one that could figure out anything in the whole wide world."

As he walked with his young grandchild to their favorite story telling couch, Artemis decided that aging wasn't quite so bad. The body gets old, the bones grow tired and eyesight fades. All this is true. Then grandchildren come to visit, and your life becomes a fairytale to tell for all ages, and aging isn't quite so bad after all. He made the Manor…magical.

_-I'm 99 for a moment, and time for just another moment-_

**T**ired, Artemis sat next to the grand master bed. He could barely move on his own any more. They had had to get James and Niall to move all their belongings to the first floor. Neither he nor Kristina could manage the stairs.

"Artemis," His Kristina's voice seemed frailer than it ever had, "Artemis I am so very tired."

With foggy eyes, Artemis turned his attention to the bed where his wife lay, "Love, so am I."

She smiled up at him, her silver hair haloed around her, the curls long since turned to waves. "Remember when we first met?"

Artemis chuckled. How could he forget? "You were convinced I needed a friend." Reaching out with a shaky hand, he stroked her cheek.

"Well, you did." She insisted. "Terribly lonely child you were."

Artemis could not argue with the truth. "But you found me. You made me better."

His wife made a satisfied noise in the back of her throat. "Yes, I think I shaped you up quite nicely."

Letting out a laugh, Artemis agreed. "And our first kiss in the back of my Bentley."

"If I remember correctly, I tried to hit you afterwards."

"You found it in your heart to forgive me eventually."

Kristina nodded slowly. "I did, eventually. Besides, you certainly made up for it. All the trips to see my family, sitting through my father's psychiatric evaluation, the time you took me on a tour of Ireland for our anniversary…"

"You became my life, Kristina. You and our children."

"And you became my soul." She said, her voice faint.

"I love you, Kristina." Artemis said, grasping her hand in his own. "I love so very much."

"I love you too, Artemis. And I always will."

They stayed like that for an hour or two, hands clasped, staring out the window and awaiting the inevitable. Then, Kristina's breathing slowed, her eyes closed for the very last time and just like that, the love of Artemis's life vanished. His Kristina was gone, but at the same time, she was still there and Artemis was so very tired. He kept his grasp on her hand and his eyes out the window. He loved Kristina Nicole Fowl. Loved her more than anything in the world. And for 84 years, she had loved him back. How could ever need anything more? Slowly, Artemis's eyes closed and his heart joined the only thing it had ever needed: His Kristina. His Kristina at last. His Kristina forever.

_-I'm just dreaming, counting the ways to where you are-_

**D**eath crept slowly through the Fowl estate. Death crept slowly closer to greet his next friend and Artemis was ready. Beckett and Myles sat beside him, solemn and worn out. His parents waited in graves of their own, long gone from this world. Death crept slowly closer and Artemis was not afraid. How could he ever manage fear again, for he had imagined the most beautiful past he had never had. He had imagined his meteor, his shining, blinding love. And there had been children. In another life, he might have had children. For now, the image of his meteor was all he needed. Death crept slowly closer and Artemis prepared to meet him as a friend. For in Death he would see Kristina. In Death lay Love. In Death lay Redemption.

Death crept slowly to his new friend and Artemis embraced the all consuming light. For a moment, a brief and shining moment, he could see them all waiting for him. His Kristina, Isabelle, James, Tegan and Niall. Little Niall held out a hand to the Father-He-Could-Have-Had and Artemis took it.

Death crept slowly away from the Fowl estate, and Artemis Fowl the Second went willingly with him.

* * *

**Remember, the Rapid Review Rabbit loves you all!** Hope you enjoyed your one-shot present. Feel free to follow me on twitter (justaravenclaw) _xxx Moda_


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